


Can't, Won't

by whitherwaywill



Series: one chapter wonders [12]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Character Death, Crucio, F/M, Gen, Legilimency (Harry Potter), Mention of torture, Occlumency (Harry Potter), POV Draco Malfoy, POV First Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-04 17:34:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25370191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whitherwaywill/pseuds/whitherwaywill
Summary: Narcissa is dead, and Draco's loyalties are shifting.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Series: one chapter wonders [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1689838
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	Can't, Won't

I need to let my shield down.

"Malfoy, you need to quit the occlumency."

Potter's voice grates on my nerves, scraping through them to stab at my mind. I _know_ I need to 'quit the occlumency'. I need to let my shield down, so I can let Granger in.

So I can show them I'm trustworthy.

"Shut up, Harry, you're not helping -"

"- don't understand why we're doing this, anyway -"

"He's a _Malfoy_ , we know they're all bloody evil -"

"- Fred's right, this is probably one of You-Know-Who's ploys to get another spy in the Order, since he killed Snape -"

"I know Tom, this is exactly the sort of shit he'd pull -"

"Right, Ginny, play the possessed card -"

"Ron, don't bait your sister -"

" - just a boy, look at him, he's so pale and skinny -"

"Mum, just because he looks weak doesn't mean that he's not a little ferret -"

Their voices are tiny needles stabbing into my shield, and I can't let them in, I can't, I can't let them in -

"Will everyone _SHUT UP_!"

Granger shouts, right beside my ear, and I flinch. I hate myself for flinching, but apparently that's what I do now - I cower and I flinch, I let the Dark Lord kill my mum and I let the Order of the bloody Phoenix walk all over me.

I can't even summon a sneer or a smirk at the shocked looks on all of their faces, a brood of Weasleys and Potter gaping at Granger. My face feels frozen in the same expression I wore when I watched the Dark Lord shoot my mum down. I can't look them in the eyes. I can't bring myself to feel disgust at the many, many Weasleys, at Mrs. Weasley's sympathy, or at that look in Potter's eyes that says 'Great Merlin, Malfoy is broken, there's no way he could be a spy…'

It's true, I suppose. I am broken.

"...Malfoy. Malfoy. Malfoy!"

Granger's voice suddenly breaks through an underwater bubble I had forced my ears into. She's staring at me, and I can't mistake her concern for anything else. If I used Legilimency on her, if I dove into her mind, her internal monologue wouldn't be much different than Potter's.

She doesn't break focus as she asks - _more like orders_ \- the rest to leave.

"Can we have the room, please?"

Potter and Weasley - I mean, the Weasel - put up a pithy fight, but it's pretty clear they're used to taking orders from Granger.

I had wondered who took over, after I killed Dumbledore. I had assumed it would be Potter, or one of the adults. But Granger makes sense. She makes sense, as their leader.

She's the one I have to convince to let me live. Even if I'm not sure I want to anymore.

After everyone clears out of the room, Granger looks me in the eye.

"You need to let me in, Malf - Draco," she says softly. "I believe you, but unfortunately we need proof, and we don't have any Pensieves lying about."

"I'm telling the truth," I manage, forcing my lips to move. "The Dark Lord killed my mother, and I am here to help you kill him in return."

"I believe you," she says again, "but you have to let me in -"

" _You're letting me in, Draco!" Aunt Bellatrix sing-songed her words, laughing gleefully. I was alone in our large dining room - well, not alone._

_The Dark Lord sat on his pretentious chair, the one he had appropriated into a throne. My father knelt at his side, holding my mother down beside him._

_I let out a garbled moan; I couldn't handle more than that._

_Aunt Bella tore through my mind, viciously attacking my shield. It was all I could do to not scream as my mind scrambled, all my worthless little secrets racing to opposite corners, hiding._

_My shield was in tatters before the Dark Lord called her off, hanging by aching, pounding shreds. As soon as the attack let up, I could no longer control my body. I collapsed, my head falling against the floor with a dull thud._

" _A disappointing performance," the Dark Lord hissed. Aunt Bella returned to his side, her hair sparking with magic. I couldn't look at her, at this deranged facsimile of a person. "You must train him better, Narcissa, if you wish for him to become a full-fledged member of my cadre."_

_He dismissed me with a wave of his hand, turning to Bellatrix. My father finally let my mother go, and she scrambled up off the floor over to where I had collapsed._

_Mum's hands were red where my father held them against the unforgiving floor, and there were bloody crescents in her palm where her nails had bit through the skin. Still, she cupped my face in her hands, drawing me off the floor and guiding me out of what has become the Dark Lord's torture chamber._

" _Draco…"_

_I don't want to hear the rest._

I yank myself out of the little scene, forcing the memory down. This time, it's Granger who's flinching back from me. My mouth pinches. It's clear that she was trying to read me, and she managed to get a flash of what I was thinking - what I was remembering.

"Is that how you learned Occlumency?" Horror is stitched into her every word, and I can't blame her.

I clear my throat. I can't look at Granger. I can't stand the pity in her eyes.

"No." It wasn't. "Mum - my mother taught me Occlumency. Legilimency, too."

"Narcissa?" Granger sounds shocked, and vaguely intrigued. It's understandable. Most people don't - _didn't_ \- see my mother as anyone but a trophy wife. It stands to reason that the Order would be similarly shocked to learn my mum has - _had_ \- any actual magical power.

" _Focus, Draco."_

" _This is boring," I complained, slouching in my chair. Mum fixed me with an iron stare._

" _Would you prefer to be playing Quidditch? Or reading your ridiculous sports magazines?"_

" _Yes," I said grouchily. "The Quidditch Cup is in a few weeks, Mum, I have to keep abreast of the players and their…"_

_She waved her hand, and I stopped talking. "This is more important," she insisted. "Keep me out, and I will let you return to your game for today."_

_I sighed. "Very well."_

_She turned my head, and made firm eye contact with me. Her eyes glinted with magic, as she prepared for legilimency. "Imagine a shield," she suggested quietly. "A large, impenetrable bubble. Or a brick wall. Anything strong enough to keep someone out."_

_I nodded, and took a breath, forcing up my shield. Mum began to read my mind, her attempts fluttering against my shield like a torrent of rain._

_It was hard, but I managed to keep her out. She had been forcing me to practice every day of the summer break. This was only the second time I kept her from seeing my most embarrassing memories._

_Her disdain after seeing the memories connected to the hippogriff debacle had been motive enough for me to get better at occlumency, and fast._

" _Excellent," Mum said, her eyes sparkling as she withdrew. "You kept me out. But I am not powering through your shields the way an attacker would."_

" _Mum?" I straighten. "I… an attacker?"_

_She closes off her emotions, hiding it behind that emotionless, cold mask she taught me. "Never mind, darling," she said, pulling me into a hug. I returned the hug, albeit with a tad bit of apprehension._

_I didn't want to think too hard about whatever it was that had Mum scared enough to teach me occlumency as a defense against 'attackers'..._

_Suddenly, Mum falls away, and there's a flash of green light, and we're not in her sitting room anymore we're in the cavernous great hall and the Dark Lord is seething and hissing and -_

I escape my memories with a gasp, my chest aching. I wonder if I had forgotten to breath while I showed Granger that little snippet. I had done it on purpose, this time. Well… all except for the last part.

I fold over, dry heaving on the floor. Granger braces a hand on my back. Finally, I muster the energy to sit up again. I can't meet her eyes.

Somehow, Granger is holding my hands, her skin incredibly, impossibly warm. I soak it in. I can't remember the last time a living person touched me without making it hurt.

"Tell me what happened," she says softly, and my shoulders sag. "Tell me why you left."

I close my eyes, and take a deep breath. Then I open them, and meet her gaze. My shield is malleable, soft and trusting. Even after that horrible twist, it hadn't pulled itself back up again.

She's taken me apart like a skilled interrogator. I should care more than I do, but I can't. I won't.

I open my eyes, and meet her gaze. "I'll show you."

_The Dark Lord was disappointed in me._

_His displeasure was compounded; my father's failure at the Ministry of Magic was still fresh in his brain, no matter that it had happened over two years prior._

_He ranted and raved, pacing back and forth before my family. All three of us Malfoys were prostrated at his feet - me, then my mother, then my father. I tried to tune out the Dark Lord's invective, but the attempt was futile._

_I had let an entire cell of Order members escape. Admittedly, I hadn't tried too hard to stop them._

_Now I was going to pay the price._

" _It occurs to me that you may need more incentive to perform better in the future," the Dark Lord hissed. "This has been one strike too many against the Malfoy name."_

_I didn't see my mother die. I was too busy groveling, my face almost pressed against the floor as I knelt before the Dark Lord. All I saw was a flash of green light out of the corner of my eye._

_My father let out a noise like a wounded animal, and I tensed, not daring to raise my head._

_The Dark Lord's pacing stopped right by me. He grabbed my chin, and forced my head up, to face him._

" _There will be no more failures," he spat, shoving my head to the side._

_My gaze landed on my mother. She was laying crumpled on the floor, frozen. Her chest wasn't rising or falling._

_It took me longer than it should have to connect the flash of green light with my mother's crumpled body._

" _Mum?" I choked out, my eyes wide with disbelief. He didn't - he couldn't have - my mum -_

" _It will be your father next," the Dark Lord said. "No more failures, Draco."_

_He let go of my chin, stalking out of the room, but I was frozen._

_My father was keening, crawling across the floor and gathering my mother in his arms. I could barely believe my eyes._

_My mother was dead._

I come back to myself, the memory subsiding back into that deep, dark corner I had shoved it into. This time, I don't shy away from Granger's reaction.

She looks like she wants to throw up. "I knew you were telling the truth."

"Can you vouch for your peers? I'd prefer not to toss that memory into their minds." I can feel a hint of my old self returning, a lofty lilt to my voice, now that I'm not the only one who carries the burden of my mum's death.

She nods. "Yeah," she says. "I think… I think we can arrange for asylum. So long as you help us - help us take down You-Know-Who."

A million little pieces sweep through my mind - Aunt Bella's cackle, the feeling of a crucio, my father's hands gripping my shoulders hard enough to bruise - and something else, a young, young Hermione Granger flinching back as I spat the slur that had been drilled into my mind at her.

"I… I can," I say. "I don't know how much I know…enough, I hope…"

Granger nods in solidarity, a hard tilt to her jaw.

I _can't_ let my mother's death go unavenged. I _can't_ let the Dark Lord reign freely, not when he aimed his wand at my mother and said those deadly words. I _can't_.

I _won't_.


End file.
